1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a receiver set, an information apparatus and a system for receiving transmitted digital information. The present invention in particular, relates to connections of the apparatuses within the system which reproduces and records the received digital data upon a basis of a receiving contract. Hereinafter, the invention will be explained when being applied to the system, the apparatus and/or the receiver set for receiving video/audio information of various broadcast programs which are distributed by the digital broadcast services. However, the present invention not limited only to this, it also can be applied to a system and/or an apparatus relating to sending and receiving of data, such as one for data transmission, with a similar construction.
2. Description of Prior Art
In recent years, digital broadcasting services using a communication satellite began in United States of America, and also Japan started digital multi-channel broadcasting using the communication satellite (CS) from 1996, therefore, various kinds of digital broadcasting services will be available in the coming future. Further, the study in digitalization of the current broadcasting with use of ground radio waves (analogue broadcasting) has also progressed.
In the current digital broadcasting services, with use of the format MPEG2-TS (Transport Stream), i.e., the multiplexing and separating method for coping with multi-programs, a plurality of programs are multiplexed and distributed, and the audio/video data of the aimed or designated program is extracted by a digital broadcast receiver set.
As the broadcasting services, in addition to a free broadcasting service, there are also offered services, including a charge or pay broadcasting service, for which a receiving contract must be made, and a PPV (pay per view) broadcasting service, with which a fee must be paid for an amount of viewing thereof, etc.
Under such the situation, in particular, in a field of household electric appliances and computers, etc., there is aggressively studied and developed a digital broadcast receiver set for receiving such the digital broadcast programs, as well as a digital TV for reproducing the received programs and a digital VTR for recording thereof.
Further, as one of such communication systems, a transmission system using IEEE 1394 Serial Bus or USB (Universal Serial Bus) is proposed, in which the data and the control signals are transmitted and/or received between or among the digital apparatuses connected by a controller bus which can transmit the data and the control signals in mixture thereof. In this system, depending upon various connection modes of the apparatuses, a node ID is automatically assigned to each apparatus thereof. If an apparatus is newly added into that system, or is extracted or taken out therefrom, a bus reset is executed, so as to automatically assign the node IDs to them corresponding to the new mode of the connection, again. Here, in the current receiver for the digital broadcasting, only one program which is aimed or selected is extracted from the plurality of the programs which are distributed or transmitted in multiplexed condition, to be displayed onto an output device such as the TV, therefore, only one channel can be displayed to be viewed at onetime. Therefore, for a plurality of people to view the different broadcast programs respectively, there must be provided a plurality of the digital broadcast receiver sets. For instance, for viewing the plurality of digital broadcast programs on the plurality of output devices in a home, the plurality of the digital broadcast receiver sets must be purchased corresponding to the number thereof. This, however, causes a problem that it is very uneconomical or money consuming for the users.
Further, for viewing the pay broadcast programs and the PPV broadcast programs with the digital broadcast receiver sets mentioned above, a receiving contract is necessary for each one set of the digital broadcast receiver. Accordingly, the contract must be made every time when a new digital broadcast receiver set is purchased or introduced into a home, and at the same time, a control or management of receiving contracts must be made for each of the digital broadcast receiver sets separately, therefore it takes a time and labor or is rather troublesome.
Further, for viewing the PPV broadcast programs, other than the contract, a connection of the digital broadcast receiver set with a telephone circuit is also necessary so as to notify the charge information to the providers of the broadcast programs.
Accordingly, in order to provide a plurality of the digital broadcast receiver sets, a consideration must be paid not only on the location thereof but also on the construction for connecting it with the telephone circuit.
Moreover, it can be conceived that the broadcasting services basically comes to be the charge or pay services when the digitalization progresses in the future on the BS and the ground radio waves, and in that instance, any means will be necessitated for protecting from illegal viewing and recording of the programs.